


We'll Always Have the Angelika

by 70sBabe



Category: Gossip Girl
Genre: F/M, One Shot, a lil angsty but a lot of fluff, blair always loved chuck, chuck always loved blair, old movies and ice cream
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2019-06-24 05:07:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15623211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/70sBabe/pseuds/70sBabe
Summary: She had always been his light. Always.





	We'll Always Have the Angelika

She had always been his light. Always. 

The first time Blair had guided Chuck out of the dark haze he so often found himself wandering in, they were twelve years old. Seems a bit young for fogs of depression, but on the Upper East Side, if you weren’t on Prozac, you weren’t living.

Chuck Bass had always known he had killed his mother. No one had had to tell him in so many words; he heard it in the way one of his nannies had delicately said “she passed away during childbirth.” He heard it in the way his friends’ mothers cooed “Poor dear” when they thought he was out of earshot. Most of all, he heard it in his father’s silences. Every unspoken word was another accusatory finger pointing towards one Charles Bass.

He had learned to wear it lightly. He often lied about his mother’s death: a plane crash, an overdose, drowning in the Mediterranean Sea. He enjoyed spinning stories out of thin air, holding people in the palm of his hand with nothing more than his words and his imagination. But, no matter how many times you push them away, your troubles will always come back to you.

It was January 19th. His 12th birthday. Bart was on a business trip; milestones meant nothing to his father and they meant even less when they shared the same date as his wife’s death. Chuck didn’t expect or want a party, but his latest nanny, a kindly older woman named Mrs. Stevens, had insisted on it. All of his friends had been invited to a miniature carnival set up inside the ballroom of The Palace and they had turned out in full force.  _ At least I can say I’m popular _ , Chuck thought bitterly as he slouched against a wall in the darkest corner of the room. He was hiding from Nate because he knew that, with Nate’s sunny, can-do attitude, he would be dragged into the middle of the party and forced to try and have a good time. That was the last thing he wanted.

When the party was over and everyone had gone home, Chuck would return to his penthouse suite and do what he always did on this day: watch  _ Casablanca _ and eat as much chocolate ice cream as he could before he felt like he would barf it all up. He didn’t know much about his mother but Bart had let these few details slip. Chuck knew that  _ Casablanca _ had been her favorite movie and that she could never resist a chocolate ice cream cone and he held on to these scraps of a person as tightly as he could.

“Typical,” an annoyed voice shattered his reverie, forcing him to return to the ridiculous party he was currently being tortured by. Blair Waldorf was standing in front of him, hands on her hips and toes tapping impatiently.

“What do you want?” he snapped back, too tired to force his voice into the smooth, even tone he usually tried to employ.

“This is  _ your _ party, so why am I finding you huddled in the corner? What  _ would _ Emily Post say?” Blair had affected her own angry tone to match his.

Blair Waldorf was a constant fixture in Chuck’s life. They had known each other since kindergarten; with parents who ran in the same social circles and the exclusive prep schools that they were both shuttled off to, how could they not be familiar with one another? And when Nate and Blair had started their little middle school flirtation, Chuck and Blair were shoved even closer together.

Chuck liked to complain about her bossy ways, how uptight she could be, and how she never really seemed to laugh. He liked to tease her about her knee socks and her headbands and her doting daddy, but secretly, he admired the steel in her voice and the fire in her eyes. There was strength unknown in Blair Waldorf and a part of him hoped she would never have to use it. He felt protective of his friends. He knew the darkness that this world could hold and he wanted them to live in the sunlight of childhood for as long as possible.

“Blair, as fun as our routine repartee sessions usually are,” Chuck pinched the bridge of his nose and squeezed his eyes shut, hoping to banish the headache he could already feel coming on. “Today is really not the time.”

“It’s your birthday.” Her voice was a little softer. Perhaps she had picked up on the melancholia in his demeanor. “Shouldn’t you be at least  _ trying _ to have fun on your birthday?”

“I don’t like birthdays or birthday parties, and even if I did, _ this _ ,” he gestured vaguely at the bright, colorful decorations and the gleeful shouts of his peers. “is the last thing I would want.”

“Alright, then.” Blair set her lips in a firm line. “So this isn’t to your taste.”

“That’s an understatement.”

“Well then, what is?”

“What do you mean?” Chuck asked wearily, praying that Nate would appear and drag his nosy girlfriend away.

“If you could be doing anything right now, what would it be?” Blair said it so simply, like she was positive that, no matter his response, she would be able to make it happen. Chuck didn’t doubt it, so maybe that’s why he answered truthfully. Or maybe it was the look in her eyes, full of compassion with just a ghost of pity. She was one of the few who knew how his mother had really died. She didn’t know how Chuck blamed himself for it, of course, but he had a feeling that if he did share that secret with her, she would face it with the same studied practicality that she faced all problems with. So, he told the truth.

“Watching  _ Casablanca _ and eating chocolate ice cream.” he muttered, looking anywhere but Blair, hoping that she wouldn’t laugh out loud. Chuck Bass, Manhattan’s resident adolescent playboy, wanted to spend his birthday watching a black and white movie and sucking down ice cream? Pathetic.

“Well, Bass,” Blair smiled primly, “I never would have guessed it, but you have  _ excellent _ taste in movies.” She pulled out a cell phone and started scrolling through her contacts. “It just so happens that the projectionist at the Angelika owes me a favor.” Noticing Chuck’s enquiring glance, she answered, “He was having sex with one of the popcorn girls in the booth when he was  _ supposed _ to be screening  _ Roman Holiday _ .”

“Waldorf, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” Chuck smirked, feeling a little more like himself.

Blair just rolled her eyes as she put her phone up to her ear. “Hello, Rodney? It’s Blair Waldorf. Time to call in that favor you owe me.”

It all sort of blurred together in Chuck’s head: their furtive escape from the party, running down the main staircase laughing their heads off, and then vaulting into his waiting limousine. They arrived at the Angelika and were quickly ushered into a theater with a closed sign plastered on the front of the door by a nervous man in a Che Guevara t-shirt.

They sat in the very middle of the theater, both still giggling at the ridiculous situation they had found themselves in, when Dorota, Blair’s stalwart ladies maid, appeared. Chuck couldn’t help but beam when he saw she was brandishing two chocolate ice cream cones.

“Thank you, Dorota,” Blair accepted her ice cream like the young princess she was.

“Happy birthday, Mr. Chuck,” Dorota smiled softly at him.

“Thank you,” he held her gaze, hoping she would see the depth of his gratitude, but she just shook her head and pointed at Blair.

“No, thank Miss Blair. All her idea.”

“Dorota, please!” Blair snapped. “The movie is starting! Have you no sense of proper cinema-going etiquette?”

As the opening theme blared and the grainy, black-and-white words  _ Casablanca _ appeared on screen, Chuck found his eyes drawn towards Blair. Once she noticed he was staring, she wrinkled her nose and snapped, “What?”

“Just….” he trailed off, not sure how to say all that he was feeling.

“I know.” Her face had softened and she had that look in her eyes again, all empathy and warmth. As the movie began, the screen lighting up with a scene of a Moroccan marketplace, she whispered, “Happy birthday, Chuck.”

Blair Waldorf had always tugged Chuck out into the world, always poked and prodded until she knew what was making him tick. She had always tried her best to show him that life could be anything you chose to make it, as long as you knew what you wanted. She refused to give up on him, even when they were nothing more than two people thrown together by circumstance. At twelve years old, in the span of a five-minute conversation, she had understood him more than anyone ever had before.

She had always been his light. Always.


End file.
